Master Chief's iconic helmet drew rapturous cheers when revealed as part of the demo of Halo's new engine

It didn't show much except for glimpses of a new world, and a very clear indication that the protagonist for the series' first four games, Master Chief, would be back front and centre.

Halo wasn't the only big franchise to have a return teased, as Gears of War 5 got a look in later on. This came by way of an extended trailer and gameplay footage, showing off the sort of blood-spattered visceral gameplay the series is known for.

Microsoft's big racing franchise Forza got a brief look in with an announcement and demo of the series' Horizon spin-off's fourth iteration.

This will be a massive open-world racer set in the UK, with gameplay showing vehicles from hovercraft to bikes via an enormous catalogue of cars. It's also got a release date -- October 2.

Forza Horizons 4 features a whole lot of open-world racing across the UK

Seasons will change the landscape massively in a shared world that looks to wrap in a number of familiar landscapes and places; the demo showed off Edinburgh, what looked like some Scottish coastline, Oxfordshire-style rolling countryside and more.

Significantly less bucolic was the slew of Japan-inspired and developed third party titles.

Devil May Cry 5 is the first new entry in that series for a decade, and it looks gorgeous.

The combat snippets shown look like the series is very much sticking to its roots of fast-paced stylish hack-and-slash combat, with a good range of up-close-and-personal ways of dispatching a variety of gruesome demons.

Slightly less flashy is Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice, which is coming from From Software, the studio behind the punishing Dark Souls games. It pits the player as an undead ninja in what looks like a version of Shogunate-era Japan against a horde of foes. That's arriving in early 2019.

Namco-Bandai debuted Jump Force, a crossover action game sure to get anime fans excited. It's got Naruto, Dragon Ball and One Piece characters fighting each other, along with a whole heap of others from the 50-year history of Japan's weekly Jump manga magazine.

Kingdom Hearts' Xbox debut was also confirmed, with characters from Disney's Frozen, including Elsa and Olaf, making their debut in the massively popular east-meets-west RPG. series.

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The E3 demo for The Division 2 showed a decidedly more summery side to the game, and the capture of a checkpoint by Air Force One

Ubisoft also demoed a sequel to The Division, which steps out of the winter in quarantined New York to the summer in an overrun Washington DC. Gameplay looked very similar to the first game, but with fewer loading screens or equivalents.

It's got a bigger open world than before, with gameplay showing off a battle around the wreckage of Air Force One in the shadow of the Capitol.

The conference also featured a slew of indie games, and quick peeks at third-party non-exclusive titles including Fallout 76, Shadow of the Tomb Raider, Battlefield V and more.

You can see all the video footage for all the games Microsoft showed off over on their YouTube channel, where they have collated them all into one handy playlist.